It's a Celebration, Bitches
Enjoy Yourselves
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My older brother owns O'Donnell's Irish Pub in Eugene, Oregon. While he works in the liberal capitol of Oregon, he lives in Springfield, the next door redneck flip-world of Eugene. The man sits in the heart of Duck Country with the University of Oregon just a hop, skip and an acid-trip away while he has an Irish Pub with Oregon State Beaver paraphernalia covering every inch. But that is what makes Shon the man. He could have packed up and moved to Corvallis to flock with the birds of a similar feather.
Coinciding with owning a bar and peddling the last legal drug, the boy knows how to throw a party. I will admit, all the good parties I go to throughout the year are thrown by my older brother. I think I have partied more with him and his friends than I do with my own. All the people in Bend go to the bars after a long hard day of some outdoor activity, get pissed and try to ride their bikes home. Shon spends all of his time in a bar, so when he wants to get it on, he does it without leaving the comforts of his own back yard. He cooks fat steaks, hamburgers, sautes onions, fries up prawns, chicken, sausages, hot dogs and all things good, yummy and go good with beer.
The older brother is a coveted position; part mentor, part father and the only person you look fondly at having wooped your ass more than any other human being on the face of the planet. No matter what your older brother may have done to you in the past, you just kind of "aw shucks" your shoulders and laugh about it.
Case in Point:
As my older brother and I started getting into Middle School, we started reaching an equilibrium of physical strength where he could get me on the ground, but he couldn't do anything more after that. Enter into the picture the youngest brother, who I got to beat at will, but who knew all he had to do was run to oldest brother for protection.
One late afternoon before the parents got home, my older brother and I passed each other in the hallway, a move that is destined for either a punch in the shoulder, a head-butt or a dead-finger to the nut-sack. Any of which invariably leads to a wrestling match and further punching until someone is either bleeding, crying or broken furniture. He was Israel, I was Hamas. Cease-fires were just bursts of glaring and posturing in between bouts of senseless poundings. After a normal hallway tryst, we wrestled to his room where he promptly pinned me and we got back to stalemate. Our younger brother, Patrick, delighted in seeing me on the ground unable to do anything and was hopping around laughing and trying to get a poke in. I, of course, began flipping out that he was getting to flick my nose and press his thumbs into my eyeballs, but I still couldn't do anything. Shon looked over at his nightstand and saw his pit-hair covered deodorant and yelled at Patrick to get it. Patrick did giggling the whole time and began to start smearing it all over my face and into my mouth, thoroughly scrubbing my teeth. I was seeing red and tasting shit, feeling the slimy pit-stick juice gathering in smooth bumps in the gaps of my teeth. I am sure I got a good cheap shot in later on both of them for that, but I am not sure I will ever forget that taste. I was picking curly red hair out of my teeth and tasting Speed Stick for the next few hours.
So back to the bacchanalian 4th of July Festival. We packed it up and headed down to Springfield, Oregon, THE Springfield of the Simpson's show. Argue all you want about logistics and clues and all that crap, Matt Groenig grew up in Portland, Oregon, this is the city the show probably started from and then grew into infamy because nerds think too much into crap.
Satan, Shon's neighbor across the street, had recently purchased a nice Perl drum set which he put up in his living room. We spent the day before jamming in his house trying to sound like bad ass heavy metal ballers, but I think we rose just above Anna Nicole Smith giving a rendition of the Star Spangled banner by squeezing her tits around a large balloon. Satan hadn't had the drums long, but had played them in past so he actually knew what he was doing. The problem came in that he wasn't used to playing at a really fast pace and he didn't play all that much giving a hindrance to some physical longevity. Satan's friend Ruben came over and taught me some new riffs and I tried my best to keep up. We slammed down some Iron Maiden, Metallica, Ozzy, Judas Priest, Kiss and all other things that make you lift the sign of the evil eye at the sky and pound your head.
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